The Virginian

Thursday, January 30, 2014

Pete Seeger: Stalinist and Communist

The fact that Seeger was an apologist for the biggest mass murderer of the 20th - and an any other - century should be enough to make anyone with an ounce of morality in his body say "good riddance" at his death.

But of course the fact that many moral cretins in and out of politics and academia openly proclaim themselves as Communists gives voice to the braying classes in the popular culture who send Seeger off with remarks like this from fellow traveler Barack Obama who proclaimed that Seeger: “... believed deeply in the power of song.” Yes, and Hitler also believed deeply in the power of song, newspapers, movies and all the rest of the tolls of propaganda to bring victory to the German Superman.

But other than moral leprosy, Seeger encouraged the no-talent, nasal, whiny cohort that characterizes so much of popular American music that sprouted like fungus in the 60s as anyone with the price of a guitar emulated. The ability to actually carry a tune was immaterial since many of the sappy lyrics were spoken, not sung. And you got extra points for having a speech impediment or sounded as if you had a permanent frog in your throat.

Seeger's death makes the planet a more moral place, and one in which one's eardrums are somewhat less assaulted. .

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Obama’s pointless, traceless super-spending is now (as they used to say after 9/11) “the new normal.” Nancy Pelosi assured the nation last weekend that everything that can be cut has been cut and there are no more cuts to be made. And the disturbing thing is that, as a matter of practical politics, she may well be right. Many people still take my correspondent’s view: If you have old money well managed, you can afford to be stupid — or afford the government’s stupidity on your behalf. If you’re a social-activist celebrity getting $20 million per movie, you can afford the government’s stupidity. If you’re a tenured professor or a unionized bureaucrat whose benefits were chiseled in stone two generations ago, you can afford it. If you’ve got a wind farm and you’re living large on government “green energy” investments, you can afford it. If you’ve got the contract for signing up Obamaphone recipients, you can afford it.

But out there beyond the islands of privilege most Americans don’t have the same comfortably padded margin for error, and they’re hunkering down. Obamacare is something new in American life: the creation of a massive bureaucracy charged with downsizing you — to a world of fewer doctors, higher premiums, lousier care, more debt, fewer jobs, smaller houses, smaller cars, smaller, fewer, less; a world where worse is the new normal. Would Americans, hitherto the most buoyant and expansive of people, really consent to live such shrunken lives? If so, mid-20th-century America and its assumptions of generational progress will be as lost to us as the Great Ziggurat of Ur was to 19th-century Mesopotamian date farmers.

For those who managed to make good before the Age of Obama, or who have the looks and talent to pretend to be others in front of a camera, who have the skill to excel in sports (one in millions), they have bought insulation from its ravages. But those who live paycheck to paycheck, buy used cars on time, decide to buy chicken instead of beef because it's cheaper, and look carefully at the prices on the menu when they go out to eat know that they are stuck in an economic rut. And the economic system is being gerrymandered every day to keep them from doing better. They are being corralled, penned in and made to obey. They are learning what it's like to compete with the laborers of China and Viet Nam. For the Ruling Class, the Leftists, the Socialists, the Communists true believers this is known as progress.

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

If you dare to challenge the scientific establishment generally, and its global warming adherents specifically, you better have deep pockets and plenty of time on your hands. That is the takeaway of the last 15 months, and soon to be more, of Mark Steyn’s life — one of the recent victims of the Left’s war on speech whose case has arguably been the least-covered but most deserving of your attention.

It should also be noted that Mark Steyn thinks that National Review is a bunch of wusses:

“by far the biggest consequence of this ridiculous case is in these [National Review's] pages. If you are only a print subscriber (as opposed to an Internet reader), you will have no idea that NATIONAL REVIEW is in the midst of a big free-speech battle on one of the critical public-policy issues of our time. There have been no cover stories, no investigative journalism, no eviscerating editorials. NR runs specialized blogs on both legal matters and climate change, yet they too have been all but entirely silent. I assume, from this lonely outpost on NR’s wilder shores, that back at head office they take the view that it’s best not to say anything while this matter works its way through the courts. In other words, a law explicitly intended to prevent litigious bullies from forcing their victims to withdraw from “public participation” has resulted in the defendants themselves voluntarily withdrawing from “public participation” . That’s nuts.

And that he has disassociated himself from NR:

All people that cherish and value their freedom should stand behind the Canadian Mr. Steyn who dared speak up for American “climate deniers,” and is now representing himself in the case, having parted ways with his prior joint legal representation with National Review.

Mitt Romney said Monday that CNN's Candy Crowley overstepped her bounds by playing fact-checker during a debate between Romney and President Obama in 2012.

Appearing on Hugh Hewitt's radio show, Romney said Crowley shouldn't have interjected to confirm President Obama's claim about the evolution of the administration's talking points about the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya.

"Well, I don’t think it’s the role of the moderator in a debate to insert themselves into the debate and to declare a winner or a loser on a particular point," Romney said. "And I must admit that, at that stage, I was getting a little upset at Candy, because in a prior setting where I was to have had the last word, she decided that Barack Obama was to get the last word despite the rules that we had."

A South Carolina woman told cops that a male acquaintance stole “her government issued ‘Obama Phone’” and a pair of DVDs from her residence, according to a police report.

Rosa Clowney, a 61-year-old Spartanburg resident, told officers that she had invited a man named “Ted” over to her house Thursday night to watch a pair of movies she had borrowed from the library (“Act of Valor” and “The Bourne Identity”).

Monday, January 27, 2014

Wisconsin's Earth Shattering Kabookm

Saturday, January 18, 2014

Media and Global Warming Priests Puzzled by Sun.

The band of brothers and sisters who are part of the Church of Global Warming have one thing in common. They "know" that the globe is warming. It's now as much of their faith as the belief that they are the good people and those who disagree are anti-science knuckle-draggers when they are not on the payroll of evil oil companies.

So when reality intrudes, it has to be fitted in where it can, so long as their basic beliefs are not impacted. This is their creed:

The globe is warming and mankind is the cause.

And if it isn't warming, and hasn't for over a decade, they must find a reason that doesn't impact their faith. Maybe the sun is masking the evil impact that man has on the climate? Yes, that must be it!

It's fairly clear from this report that the Global Warming Climate Change prophets did not take the sun into account when they created their models. They have no idea what happens if the sun does not warm the earth as much as they assume. Some are desperately hoping that man has a bigger effect on the earth's climate than the sun, otherwise things can get very, very cold.

Another illustration of the fact that theirs is a faith-based belief system rather than a scientific one.

Friday, January 17, 2014

Sir Hew Strachan, an expert on the history of war, says that the president’s strategic failures in Afghanistan and Syria have crippled America’s position in the world.

President Obama is “chronically incapable” of military strategy and falls far short of his predecessor George W. Bush, according to one of Britain’s most senior military advisors.

Sir Hew Strachan, an advisor to the Chief of the Defense Staff, told The Daily Beast that the United States and Britain were guilty of total strategic failure in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Obama’s attempts to intervene on behalf of the Syrian rebels “has left them in a far worse position than they were before.”

That's some pretty strong talk from a high level individual which probably means it wasn't someone talking out of turn. People are beginning to worry that Obama could get lots of people killed.

Strachan, a current member of the Chief of the Defense Staff’s Strategic Advisory Panel, cited the “crazy” handling of the Syrian crisis as the most egregious example of a fundamental collapse in military planning that began in the aftermath of 9/11. “If anything it’s gone backwards instead of forwards, Obama seems to be almost chronically incapable of doing this. Bush may have had totally fanciful political objectives in terms of trying to fight a global War on Terror, which was inherently astrategic, but at least he had a clear sense of what he wanted to do in the world. Obama has no sense of what he wants to do in the world,” he said.

There's a book coming out which, following the book by former Secretary of Defense Gates, is part of a series of events that are helping to chip away at the political armor Obama has. After five years people are still not sure if he's incompetent or whether he actually means to destroy American culture and influence around the world. Why can't the answer be: BOTH? The 20th Century is fulled with powerful, evil men who screwed up big time.

It really doesn’t take much to trash a place once you can manage to define, influence and eventually monopolize the prevailing viewpoint. It’s inevitable when people start to see self-improvement as a futile effort. Of course, that’s exactly the viewpoint liberalism keeps pushing…unless you count “be more liberal” as self-improvement. Education? They’re for it as long as it means being more liberal. If it means what it used to mean, if it has something to do with earning a more respectable living and making yourself more self-sufficient, they’re not for it anymore. Employment? They like the kind of employment that doesn’t actually produce anything. Service and sacrifice? Only if they get to choose. The soldier doesn’t have their respect. Freedom and personal choice? Again, the choice is for them.

It’s particularly depressing in California. Most other states, the folks in charge drone on and on about how each new year is going to be the best one ever for that state. Our folks only talk about the slim chance we have at maybe surviving this “crisis,” digging ourselves out of the hole. There’s no vision for actually winning at this thing. But that’s not to say there isn’t a stated answer. It’s always there, and it’s always more liberalism. We have the crime, we have the problems with our schools, we have the high taxes. And we have people leaving. Are they all conservatives? No. Just like the graphic says, the liberals vote in the nonsense and they get sick and tired of the messes they create, so they leave. They go someplace red, that’s missing the nonsense, and then they vote in more of it over there.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

The FBI was once regarded as America's best law enforcement organization; professional, non-political and clean. Oh sure, there were cases that blemished their escutcheon - the FBI crime lab is an example - but you were not supposed to fear the FBI if your politics was either Liberal or Conservative.

No longer.

The FBI says it won't prosecute anyone at the IRS for its admitted targeting of the president's political foes. This just as the agency claims the law is no longer its main mission. So it's a political goon squad now.

According to a leak to the Wall Street Journal, the Federal Bureau of Investigation "didn't find the kind of political bias or 'enemy hunting' that would amount to a violation of criminal law." And so, nobody was likely to be prosecuted for the most blatant politicization of a federal agency within memory.

All the Bureau found was a "mismanaged" agency that enforced rules "it didn't understand." In other words, nothing to see here, move along.

That's strange stuff for an agency whose most implicated regulator, Lois Lerner, invoked her Fifth Amendment rights against self incrimination in congressional testimony last year. That she came to congressional attention was only because of her calculated announcement that the IRS had in fact targeted Tea Party groups for special scrutiny — that's right, admitted to breaking the law — in a preemptive attempt to paint her abuse of power as a customer service problem.

Her minions lied that it was only the work of low-level bureaucratic bumblers in Cincinnati. And after that sleazy string of favors that coincidentally benefited her president, she was permitted to retire on a full pension.

The reality is, the acts reeked of political targeting, the most illegal of acts, a corrupt use of government power, and a worthy target of checks and balances provided by the FBI in the name of law and order.

But for some reason, the FBI has neither interviewed the Tea Party activists targeted for intrusive scrutiny, nor has it noticed anything amiss in light of the White House's rabid attacks on Tea Party activists. It hasn't noticed the Tea Party's demonstrable political strength in its large gatherings during the most intense period of its political targeting, nor noted the president's record of "joking" about investigating political opponents.

I wonder how the FBI agents at the local level feel about this? How does the field FBI agent feel about being part of a political goon squad?

CHRIS MATTHEWS: I’m on the phone live with former Secretary of State Clinton. Thank you for calling, Madam Secretary.

HILLARY: Oh, my pleasure Chris.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Madam Secretary, what was your initial reaction when you heard the Christie people are blaming a YouTube video for the George Washington bridge lane closings?

HILLARY: Oh gosh, Chris. Not only is it shameful to blame a harmless video that nobody has seen for the massacre on that bridge, but to hide behind a lie in order to avoid responsibility is … well, it’s unconscionable.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Amazing isn’t it, Madam Secretary?

HILLARY: What kind of people are capable of such acts of cowardice, Chris? It’s deplorable, inexcusable and frankly, it’s un- American.

TRENTON – This afternoon staff members loyal to New Jersey Governor Chris Christie alleged that the September closing of traffic lanes leading to the George Washington bridge was the result of a spontaneous reaction to an anti-Islam YouTube video. Although Gov. Christie has apologized for “unwittingly” misleading the public, calling the bridge closing “embarrassing and humiliating,” his staffers have nevertheless filed a complaint with the justice department, calling for an FBI investigation. Christie spokesman Collin Reed read a brief statement to reporters.

“The information, the best information and the best assessment we have today is that in fact these were not preplanned, premeditated lane closings. That what happened was a spontaneous reaction to a vile and despicable film that pokes fun at the prophet Mohammad. Let me state very clearly and I hope it is obvious, that the New Jersey Governor’s office had absolutely nothing to do with this insensitive video. We absolutely reject its content and message and call for the immediate investigation of its filmmaker.”

After attending a fundraiser at Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein’s Malibu home today, President Obama was asked by reporters to comment on the latest news out of New Jersey.

obama egypt Chris Christies Staff Blames Bridge Closing on Anti Islam Video“I want to personally extend my heartfelt sympathies to the victims of the lane closings,” Obama said. “If I had family members who commuted from New Jersey to New York, some of them would look like the folks stuck on the George Washington bridge. Now, it seems highly implausible that the horrifying chaos so many of us watched unfold on that bridge was a spontaneous reaction to a silly YouTube video. And I find it even harder to believe the American people are gullible enough to accept such a ludicrous story. The American people aren’t stupid.”

And this is a pitch perfect Chris Mattews spoof:

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Thank you for calling, Madam President. I’m back with my guest, African American journalist, Eugene Robinson. (Looks at Robinson) What the heck is going on in New Jersey, my African American friend? Is this Chris Christie’s dress stain? His illegitimate love-child? His toe-tap in the airport men’s room?

EUGENE ROBINSON: Well I ….

CHRIS MATTHEWS: And my God, what about the covert racism? Are Republicans ever going to evolve from the Jim Crow era? Did you happen to notice how many times Gov. Christie said bridge during his mea culpa?

CHRIS MATTHEWS: But the gall, Eugene … laying the blame for the lane closings on a video nobody’s seen? Is that the best they can do? How stupid do these white men think we are? Is it any wonder Republicans have alienated women and Hispanics? Huh? Talk to me my African American friend.

EUGENE ROBINSON: Well, what I think ….

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Hold on, Eugene. (listens to earpiece) Looks like they need to wipe the spittle off the camera lens again. Let’s take a commercial break and when we come back, MSNBC lesbian Rachel Maddow will tell us about the devastating effects Christie’s bridge closing had on the LGBT community. You’re watching Hardball!

(You do know that no one ever says anything on Hardball except Matthews. His guest could as well be cardboard cut-outs.)

Do you want to end World Hunger?"

The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the Navy Cross to Corporal Clifford M. Wooldridge, United States Marine Corps, for extraordinary heroism while serving as Vehicle Commander, Combined Anti-Armor Platoon White, Weapons Company, Third Battalion, Seventh Marines, Regimental Combat Team 2, FIRST Marine Division (Forward), I Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward) Afghanistan, on 18 June 2010 in support of Operation ENDURING FREEDOM.

When their mounted patrol came under intense enemy fire, Corporal Wooldridge and his squad dismounted and maneuvered on the suspected enemy location. Spotting a group of fifteen enemy fighters preparing an ambush, Corporal Wooldridge led one of his fire teams across open ground to flank the enemy, killing or wounding at least eight and forcing the rest to scatter. As he held security alone to cover his fire team’s withdrawal, he heard voices from behind an adjacent wall. Boldly rushing around the corner, he came face-to-face with two enemy fighters at close range, killing both of them with his M-249 Squad Automatic Weapon.

As he crouched back behind the wall to reload, he saw the barrel of an enemy machine gun appear from around the wall. Without hesitation, he dropped his empty weapon and seized the machine gun barrel. He overwhelmed the enemy fighter in hand-to-hand combat, killing him with several blows to the head with the enemy’s own machine gun.

His audacious and fearless actions thwarted the enemy attack on his platoon. By his bold and decisive leadership, undaunted courage under fire, and total dedication to duty, Corporal Wooldridge reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and of the United States Naval Service.

Ann Coulter does a masterful job of reminding us what had the news media fixated in 1987 - the hoax orchestrated by MSNBC host Al Sharpton:

Back in November 1987, 15-year-old Tawana Brawley was found curled up inside a plastic bag in an apartment building parking lot. She had feces and racist graffiti all over her body, her clothing was torn and burned, and she was apparently unconscious.

When she emerged from her (fake) unconsciousness, she claimed she had been held captive in the woods for several days, while being raped and beaten by six white men, including policemen and the local prosecutor.

The story being utterly preposterous, every law enforcement agency in the universe was called in to investigate -- the FBI, local, county and state police. Gov. Mario Cuomo directed the state attorney general, Robert Abrams, to investigate Brawley's claims.

MSNBC's Al Sharpton was one of Brawley's "advisers" throughout this massively expensive investigation, along with lawyers Alton Maddox and C. Vernon Mason -- both later disbarred.

Eight months and 1.3 million taxpayer dollars later (in today's dollars), the purported attack was exposed as a complete fraud. It turned out that Brawley made up the gang-rape story to avoid explaining to her volatile stepfather why she hadn't come home for four nights straight.

Among other findings, the grand jury's 170-page report noted these facts:

-- Witnesses saw Brawley getting into the plastic bag by herself, and then hopping around in it before curling up into a ball on the ground.

-- The hospital rape tests were negative and no semen was found anyplace on her body.

-- She had no recent bruises or other marks on her body consistent with rape.

-- Hospital technicians who evaluated Brawley concluded that she was faking unconsciousness.

-- Brawley was well-nourished, had clean breath, no bruises or injuries to her body and was not suffering from exposure, despite temperatures having dropped to freezing several times when she was allegedly being gang-raped in the woods.

-- Witnesses had seen Brawley in a vacant apartment where she had once lived during the period of the alleged attack.

-- In that apartment, investigators found charred fibers matching the burnt clothes Brawley had been found in, the source of the material that had been stuffed in her nose and ears, and the feces that had been smeared on her. Investigators even identified the dog whose feces it was. Her dirty clothes were still in a washing machine in the building.

At no point did Sharpton question Brawley's story or urge her to recant. To the contrary, as the case fell apart, Sharpton's demagoguery rose to Olympian heights.

He branded Abrams "Hitler," called Gov. Mario Cuomo a racist, and demanded that Cuomo appoint Maddox special prosecutor on the case. (It was a reasonable request: Maddox had accused Abrams of masturbating to photos of Brawley.)

Even in 1997 -- a decade after Brawley's story had been proved a hoax beyond a scintilla of a doubt -- Sharpton arranged for her to give a speech to his United African Movement at a Brooklyn church.

I find it hard to believe that Al Sharpton did not know Brawley was lying about being raped by a Nazi cult on the Wappingers Falls police force.

Just a reminder; this is the same news media that are feeding us the same kinds of lies by Team Obama and his allies including ... wait for it ... the "reporter" Al Sharpton. Keep in mind that this was a "story" where the key element was race baiting. Times really have not changed at all; the same race baiters are still at it. You can keep this media, of you want it. Me, personally, not so much.

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Last week, we learned that the head of the “probe,” Barbara Bosserman, is a donor to Obama campaigns and the Democratic National Committee. This is, someone who could hardly be trusted to understand what all the fuss is about.

Now we learn that the FBI has “concluded” that there was no actual illegal activity involved in the IRS scandal, conclusions reached without ever speaking to a single conservative or Tea Party organization leader or attorney to learn what actually happened these past four years.

Of course they can get away with it because there is no one who can actually stop them. It's the Chicago way where graft and corruption is tightly controlled by the Democrat machine. In Chicago the cops and judges are part of the corrupt system. Obama and his team have brought that system to DC with Eric Holder guiding the cops and the IRS as the enforcers. Until that criminal conspiracy is brought down, no change is possible.

Yelling about it will not create an immediate fix because the victim's cries are gagged by a media that's allied to Team Obama. But it does have the effect of energizing the conservative cadre who are going to have to come out on election day and remove the corrupt enablers.

This kind of complaint may only be heard withing the conservative echo chamber, but at least it's heard. The key to bringing down a corrupt system is first to let people know that they are not alone. That then leads to a Preference Cascade that brings the rotten edifice down, suddenly and often unexpectedly.

On December 23, 2012, David Gregory waved the now infamous 30-round ammunition magazine on air during a Meet the Press interview with Wayne LaPierre of the NRA following the Sandy Hook school shooting.

You are witnessing a crime being committed. The criminal, David Gregory, was not prosecuted because "he had not previous record." And his wife knew the prosecutor.

Fallon: President Obama invited unemployed Americans to the White House for a discussion on income inequality. Because if there’s one way to show sympathy for the unemployed, it’s to have them over to a giant white mansion where you get to live for free.

Leno: That MSNBC anchor has apologized for making fun of a Mitt Romney grandchild. She said from now on before she goes on the air, she’ll remind herself that some people may actually be watching MSNBC.

Since ASA announced its academic boycott of Israel, we have confirmed that 6 universities have dropped their Institutional Memberships, while 11 more have denied being Institutional Members despite being so listed.

The updated list appears at the very bottom of this post.

While over 190 university presidents have denounced the ASA academic boycott of Israel, many have decided either to keep the membership or to leave the decision to individual American Studies Departments. Some others are switching the membership listing to their American Studies Departments, rather than the full University name.

Anything other than a full termination of Institutional Membership, however, opens up the universities to legal liability for national origin discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

That potential liability is explained in a recent article by two attorneys at the Seyfarth Shaw law firm.

Read the whole thing.

One college that is in our area, the College of William & Mary, will be asked about this.

The problems with a politicized IRS may be far more serious than we have yet suspected. Sarah Palin's brother Chuck Heath, Jr. posted the following on his Facebook account January 11th:

My father, who worked multiple jobs and faithfully and honestly paid his taxes for fifty years, had never heard a word from the IRS. In 2008, his daughter was tapped to run for vice president of the United States. Since that time, he has been, in his words "horribly harassed" six times by the agency. They've tried to dig up something on him but he's always operated above board.

As Glenn Reynolds reminds us regularly, Barack Obama "joked" about auditing his enemies.

Why bother with laws when the President can write his own? Who's to stop him? He's got the Senate,the judiciary, the military and the media.

“We’re not just going to be waiting for legislation in order to make sure that we’re providing Americans the kind of help they need. I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone,” Obama said Tuesday as he convened his first Cabinet meeting of the year.

Obama continued: ”And I can use that pen to sign executive orders and take executive actions and administrative actions that move the ball forward in helping to make sure our kids are getting the best education possible, making sure that our businesses are getting the kind of support and help they need to grow and advance, to make sure that people are getting the skills that they need to get those jobs that our businesses are creating.”

It is never a good omen when a president of the United States is chanting old hippie slogans, but it is especially worrisome in response to the martial chest-thumping of theocratic nutcases intent on acquiring nuclear weapons. There is still a chance that Congress might scuttle the deal by continuing sanctions, as even some Democrats are unimpressed with the plan, and we hope they will do so despite the White House warnings that it would provoke a war. Allowing an apocalyptic suicide cult to set off a nuclear arms race in a traditionally bellicose region gripped by ancient and irrational hatreds cannot end well, and doing so for the sake of giving peace a chance makes no sense.

Mr. Mutlaq said Iraq began veering toward dangerously divisive political territory during and after its parliamentary elections in 2010, when the Shiite-dominated coalition rose to power in Baghdad “because of pressure from Iran” and “because the U.S. did not act in a strong way.”

Tired of being known as a "Baldfaced Liar" Jay Carney grows a beard.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

"You can observe a lot by watching"

You can observe a lot by watching, said Yogi Berra. And it’s true, but you often have to overcome the mind’s tendency to see what isn’t there, or to ignore what is there. For example, I found a box of chocolate candy in a store. The candy is round and covered with chocolate powder, making look like a chocolate truffle. And that’s what I thought that the box said. But it didn’t, the box was actually labelled “Truffes,” French for truffles. It was actually a month before I noticed what the box really said.

Filling in missing letters or ignoring misspelled words, scanning, is indispensable as a way of reading for most of us, otherwise reading would be a chore instead of an escape into another world. It's what makes proofreading so difficult; we often see what should be there, but isn't. We can look at a page and instead of reading words, letter by letter, our minds ingest phrases, sentences even whole paragraphs at a glance while our minds create images of what an author is conveying with what are actually squiggles on a page.

But sometimes it pays to go back and read s l o w l y. I occasionally look at magazines that arrive at my home or office and try to view them from a new perspective. Instead of reading the text or glancing at the pictures I try to look deeper and see what the medium tells us about ourselves and about our culture ... and the culture of the people who created the words and the pictures. One of the most interesting magazines for doing this is called Departures, a glossy magazine produced by American Express. It’s filled with very upscale advertising for everything from jewelry and watches to yachts and planes. This leads me to observe the world of upscale culture via ads aimed at the very rich.

For example, the first 30 pages of the November/December issue were completely devoted to full page advertising. High fashion models sporting purses, watches, jewelry and clothing. Surprisingly, watches lead all other categories. Why would this be since, for most people, watches are really no longer necessary for telling us the time. Our computers tell us the time, so do our VCRs, our toasters, our thermostats, our radios, roadside signs and – of course – our phones; telling time is the number one function of cell phones. My son doesn't wear a watch but he carries his cell phone at all times. So why the ads for watches that sell for upward of $300,000? Simple, it’s a fashion statement. They don’t tell its wearers the time, it tells people who wear them, and those who see them wear them, that the wearer can afford the financial equivalent of the typical suburban home on his wrist … and pay cash. That makes the Ascot Chang (another advertiser) suit at a mere $3900 and a shirt for $335 appear a veritable bargain.

But for cultural significance what caught my eye was a two page spread for the Waldorf Astoria. The picture was taken in the Waldorf lobby of a woman wearing a tight fitting knee length knit dress walking toward us. She is looking out of the side of her eyes, looking at a man striding into the lobby with his back to us. The focus is on the woman and her obvious interest in the man. It’s not an image of a happy couple meeting at the hotel; the lobby is not even particularly attractive. The message is that the Waldorf is where bored upper class “cougars” go to find younger men. And that, along with ads for yachts that can be chartered for a million dollars per week (plus, fuel, food, drinks and don’t forget to tip) tell us a lot about our culture.

The next time you see a magazine, TV show, a movie or an Internet website, shed your preconceptions, look at it with a new eye and see the message you may have skipped at first glance. You may see things you may not have seen before. And it may teach you something about a world you may not know exists.

The Administration of the Perfectly Creased Pants, run by the guy who should have been elected to be a GQ model, (no thinking required) strikes again.

It launched two months late, but the rollout of the Spanish version of the federal Obamacare portal has been just as disastrous as its English counterpart’s October debut, according to an Associated Press report.

This time, the problem is lousy translations and glitches that send users back to the English version of HealthCare.gov.

The AP says the translations on so poor that many users feel they were computer-generated. The name of the site, CuidadoDeSalud.gov, can be litterally read as “for the caution of health.”

One health navigator who works in Miami told the wire service that, if anything, the site is written in “Spanglish.

Want to get rid of the Third Amendment out of fairness? You support the troops, don't you?

Two other young women simply agreed with everything Dice said even though most of it was nonsense. “They should be able to come into your house and they can quarter there forever if they want to.” Dice stated, as the women both replied “oh yeah definitely” and “I agree”.

These people are what make California, California. Gives new whole new and chilling meaning to the song by Whitney HJouson "Children are our Future."

Monday, January 13, 2014

"Firefighters struggled to subdue the flames as the decades-old Al-Saeh library went up in smoke on Friday in the Serail neighborhood of Tripoli. Despite firefighters' best efforts, little of the trove of historic books and manuscripts was recovered from the wreckage. 'Two thirds of some 80,000 books and manuscripts housed there,' a security source told Agence France Press, referring to the items destroyed. The source added that the blaze was started after a manuscript insulting the Prophet Mohammed was found hidden in the pages of one of the library books.

What about the Republicans? Christie burned a lot of bridges in that debate, and in his embrace (literally) of Obama in those final days of the 2012 election. Ironically, it's the Obama administration that is widening its probe into the use of those funds now. Don't expect too many Republicans to rush to Christie's side in this fight, except to point out that the $2.2 million difference between the two advertising campaign proposals amounts to 0.041% of the porkfest Barack Obama and Chris Christie demanded from Congress for Sandy relief.

He must have thought he was being smart. Such political ineptitude on display here by Christie. Piss off a huge number of your potential base so that when the opening salvo is launched you've got no allies. Well played.

What doe you do if 95 million people can't find jobs and the economy sucks?

If you're a Democrat you propose bringing in millions of illegal immigrants to take all the entry level jobs and raising the minimum wage so that Americans won't be hired. Then you extend unemployment benefits for 50 years so that no one ever needs to actually get a job.

There was a special circle of Clinton hell reserved for people who had endorsed Obama or stayed on the fence after Bill and Hillary had raised money for them, appointed them to a political post or written a recommendation to ice their kid’s application to an elite school. On one early draft of the hit list, each Democratic member of Congress was assigned a numerical grade from 1 to 7, with the most helpful to Hillary earning 1s and the most treacherous drawing 7s. The set of 7s included Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.), Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), as well as Reps. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Baron Hill (D-Ind.) and Rob Andrews (D-N.J.).

Obama Voter Remorse

Government officials and political operatives working for Christie, for weird and petty reasons, chose to make traffic worse. That’s the takeaway. When they are reminded of the fact that people working on Christie’s behalf thought it was a good political game to mire tens of thousands of their fellow Americans in the nightmarish gridlock that is a daily dreaded prospect for tens of millions, they will be discomfited by that and by the politician in whose name it was done.

And yet, you know what is also something everybody would find “relatable”? Politicians who sic the tax man on others for political gain. Everybody has to deal with the IRS and fears it. Last year, we learned from the Internal Revenue Service itself that it had targeted ideological opponents of the president for special scrutiny and investigation — because they were ideological opponents.

That’s juicy, just as Bridgegate is juicy. It’s something we can all understand, it speaks to our greatest fears, and it’s the sort of thing TV newspeople could gab about for days on end without needing a fresh piece of news to keep it going.

And yet, according to Scott Whitlock of the Media Research Center, “In less than 24 hours, the three networks have devoted 17 times more coverage to a traffic scandal involving Chris Christie than they’ve allowed in the last six months to Barack Obama’s Internal Revenue Service controversy.”

Why? Oh, come on, you know why. Christie belongs to one political party. Obama belongs to the other. You know which ones they belong to. And you know which ones the people at the three networks belong to, too: In surveys going back decades, anywhere from 80% to 90% of Washington’s journalists say they vote Democratic.

Scandals are not just about themselves; they are about the media atmosphere that surrounds them. They are perpetuated and deepened by the attention of journalists, whose relentless pursuit of every angle keeps the story going. That is exactly what has been missing from the IRS scandal from its outset; Republicans in Congress have been the dogged pursuers, not the press.

To the journalists, the Obamans don’t look like crooks and cheats. Far from it. For them, it’s like looking in a mirror.

In September, Elspeth Reeve of The Atlantic Wire took note of 24 major journalists who have taken posts at senior levels in the Obama administration. All of them have worked for decades in various news organizations, thus creating personal ties and bonds of affection with literally hundreds of working reporters and editors.

The journalists are not covering up for their friends and their spouses. They just believe the people they know could not be responsible for behaving badly, or cravenly, or for crass political advantage —and the tone they strike when such things are discussed is often one of offense, as though it is a sign of low character to believe otherwise. It would be, well, like believing the journalists themselves were crooks.

The "Big Money" Boogeyman

The shills who prate constantly about big money in politics are nauseating. Some even pretend that Obama gathered billions of dollars in contributions one dollar at a time. I recall, and probably you do too, that he gathered millions from anonymous donors via a credit card scam on which the security system was turned off. One of those donors even identified himself – and I ‘m not kidding – as Osama bin Laden, another as “Good will Hunting.”

Not one millionaire or billionaire has ever harmed me, but the Liberals in Washington have taken money from my pay and from my investment income, they have forced me to buy more expensive light bulbs, intruded into my bathroom and decided my toilet was a hazard to the planet, they have passed so many laws that I commit several felonies before breakfast. When they take charge of cities like Detroit they bleed them to death until they go bankrupt. They have forced millions to lose their health insurance under the pretense that they were going to improve American health care. They have imposed the largest Ponzi schemes in the history of the world via social Security and Medicare. They have transformed the world’s richest country into history’s brokest country without breaking a sweat. They own the distinction of spending a billion dollars on “stimulus” without actually creating a single job. They managed to elect a half-black President who promised to bridge the racial divided and who managed to set back race relations fifty years.

We are told to believe that Obama didn’t know about Fast and Furious, he didn’t know that the IRS going after conservative groups and auditing his political opponents, that he read about DOJ going after James Rosen in the paper, that NSA isn’t spying on Americans and that Benghazi was a demonstration about a video that got out of hand. We have to believe that when Obama told us we could keep our insurance, doctor and hospital if we wanted to he was telling the truth. And the press covered up the Obama scandals like a dog burying a bone.

But I’m supposed to fear rich people. Well there’s one rich person I fear and he’s named Obama. Not because he’s rich but because he or an underling can cause the entire power of the government – IRS, DOJ, EPA, and all the rest of the government’s alphabet agencies to come down on me and bury me. And even if I'm as innocent as a lamb, that will make no difference; the process will destroy me.

For all the attention Obamacare has drawn in recent weeks, few observers have noted that the law is having the unexpected, yet most welcome, effect of transforming scores of millions of Americans, virtually overnight, into generous benefactors of the less fortunate. A real-world example—representative of countless millions of similar situations—will make this crystal clear:

Let’s say that you are a healthy, hardworking 54-year-old single adult in San Francisco earning $45,960 per year—the income level at which federal Obamacare subsidies from your fellow taxpayers are no longer available to help you pay your monthly health-insurance premiums. As a San Francisco resident, you are permitted to choose from among 16 separate Obamacare-compliant insurance plans. Four of these are so-called “Bronze” plans, low-level policies whose average premium will cost you $453 per month, or $5,436 per year. In exchange for those premium payments, a Bronze plan will cover 60% of your medical expenses—that is, after you meet the $5,000 out-of-pocket annual deductible. For this priceless peace of mind, you can thank Obamacare—the Democratic Party’s gift to a grateful America.

Let us contrast your case with that of Joe, another 54-year-old single individual in San Francisco, who happens to be an obese alcoholic and longtime drug abuser with little ambition and no history of ever having held a full-time job for very long. Joe currently earns $15,860 per year, which is just above the income level that would have made him eligible for Medicaid. Because Joe doesn’t qualify for Medicaid, Obamacare stipulates that he must now purchase his own health insurance—thereby proving that, contrary to the shrill rhetoric of conservative naysayers, no one gets an undeserved free ride under Obamacare.

Like you, Joe can choose from among 16 separate plans that are available to San Francisco residents. But unlike you, he is eligible to receive federal government subsidies—money that other, wealthier Americans, such as you, magnanimously “contribute” toward the healthcare expenses of financially “disadvantaged” individuals. If he selects one of the four Bronze plans (whose average monthly premium is $453), Joe qualifies for $452 in average monthly subsidies—meaning that, regardless of which Bronze plan he chooses, he will pay a monthly premium of exactly $1. You read that correctly. The very same healthcare plan that would cost you $453 per month, is available to Joe for $1 per month—i.e., the cost of three oatmeal-raisin cookies at your local Subway sandwich shop. Over the course of a year, you will pay a total of $5,436 in policy premiums, while Joe, who sadly failed to qualify for free healthcare through Medicaid, will pay his own fair share of $12. This is all in the interest of social justice, you understand. And please, don’t even think about whispering that Obamacare might be some sort of “wealth redistribution” scheme, lest you expose yourself as a petulant reactionary who doesn’t give a damn about sick people.

The Hand of God

Gerard Vander Leun has written a wonderful essay about this, and the universe that God made along with you and me. And about the difference between "facts" and "truth."

Here's how he ends: (Excerpt:)

Do I, an exemplar of the most advanced culture in history, actually believe that this is the image, the manifestation, the fading photograph of the hand of God, the Supreme Being? Of course not. Not for a moment do I think that what I see in this image is that. I believe... no... I know for a fact that what I am seeing is merely gas and stars in a seemingly random arrangement shining in a narrow, very narrow, part of the spectrum so that, to my deeper mind and imagination, I pull together some vague shapes in the play of color on the void and relate it to what I have seen elsewhere, felt elsewhen -- and out of that produce a feeling, thought, in my mind that makes my eyes see what appears to be an impossible hand reaching across space long ago in exactly nowhere. It's a cosmic Rorschach image, a glowing gasblot somewhere in limitless space. That it is a 'hand' is impossible. It is even more impossible that it is even an image of a hand.

But that is not the most impossible thing about this image.

What is even more impossible than this utter impossibility is the fact that you see it too.

I know, from all the facts that I have learned, that if the Earth itself were positioned in relative space a few degrees this way or that, moving at a slightly different relative speed towards a slightly different point in the sky, with its local group of stars slightly tilted a bit this way or a bit that way, that the purely imaginary impression of this being a hand would disappear utterly. It might look like a dagger. It might look like a flower. It might look like nothing other than the random assortment of gas clouds that it most assuredly is. What it would not look like, given just a few minor (on the cosmic scale) variations is 'The Hand of God.'

And that's a stone cold fact. Note it. File it. Toss it to the top of the always rising mountain range of facts that we love to build as bulwarks against the dark.

But is it the truth?

Well, it is a true fact. But here's another.

After all the facts are filed, here I am and there you are. We're spinning about an immense ball of thermonuclear fire on the third stone out from the Sun. We're the end product, as of today, of a great chain of being stretching backwards in time for billions of years to a primordial spark that we do not know or understand. That spark created life here and began the long process to us. It began life that is -- as far as we know today for a fact -- the only life anywhere in the billions of light years we can see. (Yes, I know it is unlikely we are alone, but until we know differently for a fact, that's the fact.) We do not know the why of it all even though the persistence of the miracle whispers there must be a why. At the same time, it is highly likely that beings as limited as we obviously are will never know the why. The why is pretty much outside of science, barely within metaphysics, and above our evolution grade.

What we do know is that, because of how we are made and what we have become, through suffering, striving, effort and, yes, grace, that there are some six billion of us that can look at this strange image of gas and stars and somehow understand it as a hand. And that, at will, we can move our hands to write words such as these to reach across space and time and make others like us understand that although it looks like a hand it cannot possibly be one; that such a thing is utterly impossible.

If you don't think that's a miracle that surpasses all understanding, you simply don't have all the facts.

Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state who leads all 2016 presidential polls, ranks dead last on a new top 10 poll of who Americans admire most, and at the bottom of who the world admires most, behind celebs like Angelina Jolie and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

According to the new YouGov.com poll conducted for the Times of London, Microsoft's Bill Gates is the most admired person in the world, ahead of Pope Francis and President Obama, the runner-up on that list. Clinton ranks 27th on YouGov's world list.

On the U.S. list, she does even worse, coming in 10th of 10 listed and most named. Among Americans, Pope Francis is the most admired, followed by the president, evangelist Billy Graham and former President George W. Bush. Even Rush Limbaugh, the nation's most popular conservative talk radio host, beat Clinton. He came in ninth.

For the poll, YouGov went to 13 countries that hold more than half the world's population and asked people to name who they admire most. Only those living were allowed to be listed.

People all over the world agree. They don't see the appeal of a dumpy, aging, woman in relaxed waist pants suits whose only claim to fame is that she helped cover up her husband's infidelities. On the other hand, she is actually an improvement over Obama. It's rumored that "Hillary!" may not actually hate America.

Sunday, January 12, 2014

On the morning of Oct. 1, shortly after Obama had proclaimed that Maryland would lead the charge in signing up residents for new health-care plans, the director of the state’s health exchange was repeatedly rejected by the network before she became the first to log on, with the help of her IT staff.

Remember how we've been told that the States that signed up to create their own ObamaCare marketplaces were dong really, really well? It's a lie.

Read the the gory details about the disaster of ObamaCare in Maryland.

Thursday, January 09, 2014

Well, it's hard to identify with the Republicans when they try so hard to be Democrats in sheep's clothing. Looks like people are looking for a new party. Maybe somebody could do something about that, perhaps over tea?

Rep. Issa noted that current and former IRS officials revealed Barbara Bosserman, a trial attorney within the IRS's Civil Rights Commission, is leading the internal investigation.

Bosserman's leadership raises all sorts of questions about the investigation's fairness. Rep. Issa's investigations revealed that she has been a loyal financial backer of the DNC since 2004 and has donated multiple times personally to President Obama's two campaigns. Her personal donation total reaches $6,750 to both the party and President Obama.

Tuesday, January 07, 2014

Read this article which points out that not only does Rachel Maddow lie, but that she supports forced drug testing for people on welfare.

A final level of deception remains to be revealed: one of the many companies that have contributed to the State Policy Network is Comcast, which owns MSNBC and is Rachel Maddow’s employer. So in her Thursday broadcast, Maddow could equally well have said that MSNBC “ha[s] been promoting forced drug tests for people on welfare,” and that FFGA is an “MSNBC-affiliated group.” She didn’t do this for obvious reasons. She knew that she was addressing a stupid audience that would never know the difference.

If Rachel Maddow is the best that MSNBC has to offer, MSNBC is in even deeper trouble than its steep ratings decline would indicate.

Which is not to say that there’s nothing going on in the world except the cold. Al-Qaeda has recaptured the Iraqi city of Fallujah that American soldiers and Marines once fought bravely to liberate, it is increasingly apparent that Obamacare is clearly not the cure for the common cold, and the newly-inaugurated commie mayor of New York City has begun his campaign to create a socialist utopia by banning Central Park carriage rides and conveniently freeing up the stables for a campaign donor’s new development, among other things. All of it is dispiriting, but it’s hard to get one’s blood appropriately boiling about it when the wind chill is well below zero. Whatever the next debacle the Obama administration is planning, they should unleash it now while the public is preoccupied with this even more dreadful weather.

Monday, January 06, 2014

I wonder how this crap ever managed to convince people that they are looking at "art." Now I know. It was done with my tax money, and yours.

The Central Intelligence Agency used American modern art - including the works of such artists as Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell, Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko - as a weapon in the Cold War. In the manner of a Renaissance prince - except that it acted secretly - the CIA fostered and promoted American Abstract Expressionist painting around the world for more than 20 years.

Once it became fashionable, shown in top galleries and museums it was not possible to actually say it was crap if you wanted to maintain your membership in the church of what's happening now. It explains urinals and toilets on display in museums. It explains why rich plutocrats, like the people running Paine Webber, would have "art" made up of pieces of burlap scattered haphazardly over a piece of canvas displayed on the walls of their headquarters in New York City (something I saw and found hard to believe I was actually seeing). To collect and pay for this sort of garbage requires a willing suspension of disbelief, the ability to fool yourself into thinking that something ugly is actually beautiful.